SIMPLE GOOD-BYES
by Hannah
Summary: Hermione has spent years trying to find a friend of her's but when she finally finds out what happened to him she's not so sure she wanted to know. r/r!


THIS IS JUST A SIMPLE STORY THAT CAME TO ME LAST NIGHT. MY MUSE WANTED ME TO WRITE IT BUT I HAD NO IDEA WHAT I WAS WRITTING SO I JUST BEGAN TO WRITE. WHAT I'M TRYING TO SAY IS: SORRY IF IT SUCKS. I DON'T OWN ANY OF THE PEOPLE OR IDEAS CONNETED WITH THE WORLD OF HARRY POTTER OR THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA. PLEASE TELL ME WHAT YOU THINK BECAUSE THIS IS THE FIRST THING I'VE PUT UP ON THIS SITE IN A VERY LONG TIME AND I WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU LIKE/DISLIKE ABOUT IT.  
  
  
You were once   
my one companion...   
you were all   
that mattered...   
  
The woman sighed as she sat alone at the bar slowly sipping her drink. Her long brown hair was pulled into a tight no-nonsense bun at the nape of her neck and her beautiful brown eye seemed empty and drifted over the patrons of the bar. Her gaze fell on a young couple in a corner with love in their eyes and lust in their hearts and a spark came into her eyes that had been missing for so long.  
  
"Oh, Harry where are you?" She asked no one. The bartender looked at her. She had been coming here for a few years now. Every day to drink her drinks and watch the people. She seemed crazy. One day she asked him if he believed in magic! But then she began to laugh and say that it was all dead now. The man had often heard her talking to herself but this was the first time he'd heard a name. Who was Harry? He just shrugged it off though and went back to his work. He didn't question things anymore.  
  
The woman watched the young lovers with envy and sighed again. Why do I do this to myself she asked herself. Why in God's name to I put myself through hell? I'm going to go mad if I keep this up. Face Hermione, Harry's never going to come back.  
  
The woman left her money on the counter and left. She walked out into the pouring rain without giving it a thought. She walked across the street to a stout little building and headed up the stairs to her tiny flat. She could hear the phone ringing inside but she didn't care. It was probably just work calling to tell her that if she missed one more day she'd be fired. Or maybe she was being fired. What did it matter? She didn't belong here any how.  
  
She opened the door and listened as the person left a message on the machine. "Hermione? Hey... I don't know if you remember me... I'm Hannah Abbott from... Hogwarts... Could you give me a call? My number is..." But Hermione didn't hear the phone number. All she heard was Hannah's shaky voice saying "Hogwarts" Hermione remembered in great flashes the last time she'd seen the castle. Rain pouring down in buckets and fire covering everything. Faces blackened with ash and faces dead and warm from the heat. That was the night that had changed it all.  
  
You were once   
a friend and father-   
then my world   
was shattered...   
  
Once she had tried hard to block out the memories but now they came rushing at her in a flood. The man with the snake like face walking into the great hall during dinner one night. He was followed by Death Eaters and every face in the room showed the fear they could not quell. Even the Slytherins were frightened.   
  
Then the panic broke. People rushed for the exits and the teachers drew their wands. Dumbledore went down first with a barley heard curse that stopped everyone in their tracks. Voldmort sneered. "You will all watch your hero die tonight" He breathed. The entire hall swung their heads around as if they were popets on strings to look at Harry Potter. Harry gripped his wand tighter and stepped up to his adversary.  
  
They fired curse after curse and children tried to sneak out of the hall as it was happening only to find death ready in the form of Death eaters. Hermione had stood frozen next to Ron with their hands entwined. They both knew that this would be the night their fairy tale ended. And they were right.   
  
The Great Hall was on fire and in the confusion people managed to escape. They ran as fast and as hard as they could out of the castle. They were met by about ten vampire who had been stationed there to catch any who slipped by but there were too many now and the vampires were easily overtaken.   
  
Teachers began to count heads asking where so-and-so was and did anybody know if Harry was all right. Hermione turned to say something to Ron only to find him gone. She was sure he'd been right behind her when the left but he was simply gone now.   
  
They found him later. After the fire everyone went back to find who was left. No one who stayed in the room survived. Hermione found Ron's body laying in a boneless heap by a door. They found the body of Voldemort but there was no sign of Harry.  
  
Wishing you were somehow here again... wishing you were somehow near...   
Hermione knew in her heart that as hard as she searched both the magical and the muggle world her chances of finding him were slim. She picked up the phone the dial the number Hannah had left. She wondered what could have happened. She'd spent so many years avoiding any contact with any one from the wizarding world that she found herself wondering how it could have been different if she had stayed.  
  
"Hello?" Asked a pleasant female voice.  
  
"Hello? I'm looking for Hannah. Is she there?"   
"This is she. Who is this?"  
  
"it's... it's Hermione."  
  
Silence. And then, "Oh Hermione! We found him!" Her voice sounded so sad.  
  
"Found who?"  
  
"Harry."  
  
Hermione listened as she was told about how they found Harry's remains in the forest. From what they could tell he had killed Voldemort and then escaped into the forest. They had found injuries such as broken ribs and they had cause to believe one of them had pirced his lung. There would be funeral for him a few days and Hermione was welcome to come if she felt she could handle it. Hannah didn't say it like that but that was how she ment it.   
  
Sometimes it seems, if I just dreamed, somehow you would be here...   
  
For a long time after she hung up the phone Hermione sat in a chair staring at the pale white walls she had never bothered to decorate just thinking and remembering. The longer she sat thee the more doormat memories hit her. The way Ron's face was frozen in fear when she found him that next day. How when the sun shone the next morning down on the remains of the castle it reminded Hermione so much of a movie she had seen over the summer with Harry and Ron while they stayed at her house. It looked horrible. It seemed a curse from heaven that the sun shown that day.   
  
But more memories filtered through her blocked mind. A first year crying in the arms of a vampire and falling to the ground when the thing was staked and had turned to dust. The child was dead. Dead like Dumbledore. Dead like Ron. Dead like Draco Malfoy. Dead like Cho Chang. Just dead.  
  
Hermione tore her eyes off the pitiful eleven year old and stared out into the darkness beside the castle bordering on the forest. A flash of a face met her eyes for just a moment filled with sad tears in it's eyes and grief in it's heart. But then it was gone. Had it been Harry going off to die?   
  
Hermione had no time to think on it when the castle erupted in more flames. She was struck in the head and remembered nothing more until the next day.  
  
Wishing I could  
hear you voice again...  
knowing that I  
never would...   
Dreaming of you  
won't help me to do  
all that you dreamed  
I could...   
  
As she sat in the chair Hermione slipped into unremembering dreams. She dreamed that she was in a long White hall way with tall columns on either side of her. At the top of each column stood a statue of one of the people who had died in the Hogwarts Massacre. Each statue looked as if the person had simply been tossed in a pot of stone and hen removed. They were each so real she almost thought she could see them move.  
  
As she walked down the hall her shoes echoed softly in the cavernous room. Behind her she could hear movement. But she never looked back. Ahead of here she could see the statues of Harry and Ron. They sat as they often did at a chess bored in the common room at Hogwarts. The pies on the bored moved and the game was being played out. It was so eerie watching immovable stone playing chess. Hermione could almost hear Ron taunting Harry about how much he was winning by. There seemed to be something missing from the tableau but Hermione had no idea what.  
  
She turned around. The statues that had been on top of the columns were now on the ground and they had assembled in a circle around the game. Nothing moved. Then the whispering began. "Something's missing. Something's gone. Something's here... but not here..." Over and over this rhyme persisted in her head and then suddenly it stopped and one voice stood out among the rest. "Something's missing. Something's gone. Somethings don't go away and some times we have to let go." It was Harry's voice. The figure of Ron turned it's head slowly towards her and his voice echoed in her head. "We're waiting for you." Then the head turned slowly back and the stone people came to life around her.  
  
While the rest of the people went about their own business, Ron moved one more piece. "Checkmate." And Hermione woke up alone in her bed with the voices echoing in her head.  
  
"Something's missing..."  
  
Passing bells  
and sculpted angels,  
cold and monumental,  
seem, for you,  
the wrong companions-  
you were warm and gentle...   
  
The days were slow in passing but before she knew it Hermione found herself standing in a large graveyard surrounded by the millions of people Harry had touched in his short lifetime. People whispered and pointed at her but she didn't notice. All she could see through her tears was the head stone. "Here lies Harry Potter. The boy who lived and the man who died"   
  
I can't cry she told herself. No tears will bring him back and now is not the time to cry. No tears. And so she stood with her heart full of grief and love while appearing to be made of stone to an outsider. But she gave them no tear. She'd cried enough in the time she'd been hunting for him.   
  
Too many years  
fighting back tears...  
Why can't the past just die...?   
Wishing you were   
somehow here again...   
knowing we must say goodbye...   
  
At the end of the funeral each person held a s single white rose. The each one by one filed up and dropped it into the open gave. Each one landed with a soft sickening thump on the hallow coffin. Hermione sat still as if it might make her able to fade away and lie down in a grave of her own nestled in between her two best friends. She looked over to Ron's grave. Strange how they had both died the same night but his headstone was so much older. Never ment to be so old and never ment to die so young.  
  
Try to forgive...  
teach me to live...  
give me the strength to try...   
  
As she sat there she felt overcome with so many emotions and one of them surprised her so much that she let it take control of the others for a moment only. Why? How could they die and not let her come too? No. She had died that night. In every way that counts. She was dead now. She had not lived for trying to find him all these years and now her not-life was over and it was time for her to go and place her white rose in the grave. Maybe now she could try and live.   
  
She stood and held the rose over the grave. "I'll live for you two. You'll live in my memory and that way you'll not truly be dead." And with that she dropped her rose and watched as it fell on to the pile. But it had changed. She had forgiven them for her hurt and the rose had changed to a red so stunning it seemed as blood. She gave a wry smile and walked away to her new life.  
  
No more memories,   
no more silent tears...   
No more gazing across  
the wasted years...   
Help me to say   
  
Years later an old woman walked up the grassy slope to the place that Harry Potter and Ron Weasley were buried. She slowly lay down between the two graves and the wind ruffled her silver hair. "I did it," she said to the graves. "I lived. I quit my job and I worked in the wizarding world. I set of a shop that sold books for Hogwarts students and I even helped to rebuild it. I have the most popular shop in Diagon alley. Every one comes in to buy their books there and every year the children ask me about you. You really did live through me..." Her voice trailed off in the wind.  
  
A moment later she spoke again. Her voice was softer and almost desperate. "You're waiting for e right? That's what was missing from my dream was me right? I'm missing. You were right. Some times we have to let go. I did. I let go and I lived. I was never ment to be this old. I was ment to die with you that night. Never ment to be so old and never ment to die so young.  
  
"You're waiting for me right, Ron? Harry? You're waiting for me aren't you?" And with that she slipped into nothingness.   
  
They found her the next day and she was buried between the two of them and the people of the community erected a single headstone for the three of them. At the top of the stone above each of them it said their name and the dates of birth and death and then below that it read:  
  
Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger, and Harry Potter: The ones who lived  
  
Goodbye... 


End file.
